Tag Archives: Microsoft

Starting April of 2016, Visual Studio now includes Xamarin for free. This is the case for every edition of Visual Studio, including Visual Studio Community Edition, which is free as well.

With Xamarin you can develop and publish native apps for iOS and Android using C# or F# from directly within Visual Studio with no limits on app size.

For developers that are using Mac, Xamarin Studio is now available as a benefit of your Visual Studio Professional or Enterprise subscription. Developers can use the newly-created Xamarin Studio Community Edition for free.

You can visit Xamarin’s store to download Xamarin for free. Keep in mind that, Xamarin, although free, is license restricted for bigger companies. If you want to use Xamarin you will need to comply to one of the following license terms:

Individual license – If you are an individual working on your own applications to sell or for any other purpose, you may use the software to develop and test those applications.

Organization licenses – If you are an organization, your users may use the software as follows:

Any number of your users may use the software to develop and test your applications released under Open Source Initiative (OSI) approved open source software licenses.

Any number of your users may use the software to develop and test extensions to Visual Studio.

Any number of your users may use the software to develop and test your applications as part of online or in person classroom training and education, or for performing academic research.

If none of the above apply, and you are also not an enterprise (defined below), then up to 5 of your individual users can use the software concurrently to develop and test your applications.

If you are an enterprise, your employees and contractors may not use the software to develop or test your applications, except for open source and education purposes as permitted above. An enterprise is any organization and its affiliates who collectively have either (a) more than 250 PCs or users or (b) more than one million US dollars (or the equivalent in other currencies) in annual revenues, and enterprise means those entities that control (via majority ownership), are controlled by, or are under common control with an organization.

Demo use – The uses permitted above include use of the software in demonstrating your applications.

On July 20th 2015, the new Visual Studio 2015 and .NET Framework 4.6 by Microsoft became available to download.

This release is a big step to bring the productivity of these products to any developer working on any kind of application, while delivering a new level of innovation in the productivity.

Visual Studio 2015 is an integrated development environment from Microsoft with a comprehensive collection of developer tools and services, used to create apps, as well as web sites and web services.

The Visual Studio family has expanded over the years:

Visual Studio Community – a free for non-enterprise development, fully -featured, and extensible IDE for creating modern applications for Windows, Android, and iOS, as well as web applications and cloud services

Visual Studio Online – services for teams to share code, track work, and ship software – for any language, all in a single package

Visual Studio 2015 and .NET 4.6 highlights

Innovation in productivity

Debugging and Diagnostics – unified debugging and profiling into single Diagnostics Tool window; with PrefTips you can get performance information right in your code

Code editing and Refactoring – C# and VB developers can use the new Roslyn-based tooling, including Light Bulbs that pro-actively suggest potential fixes or code refactoring tooling; with code analyzers it is possible to customize warnings and suggestions delivered inside the editor; added XAML editor

Programming Languages – this new release includes the final version of C# 6 and Visual Basic 14 and improved support for C++ 11/14/17 together with TypeScript 1.5, F# 4.0 and tools for Python and dozens of other languages

Microsoft announced that on July 20th 2015, there will be a final release of Visual Studio 2015, .NET Framework 4.6 and Team Foundation Server 2015.

Visual Studio 2015 is a long expected release, which will include multi-platform creation of apps for Windows, Android, iOS, as well as creation of web applications and cloud services, and more. It also offers a wide range of tools to increase and ease the productivity of developers, like diagnostics tools, integrated editors, debuggers and profiles, plus thousands of extensions from PHP to gaming.

Microsoft has announced the release of the new operating system, Windows 10, on July 29 this year. Windows 10 is designed to run on the broadest device family ever, including, and not limited to, Windows PCs, Windows tablets, Windows phones, Windows for the Internet of Things, Microsoft Surface Hub, Xbox One and Microsoft HoloLens.

The vision of this new operating system is to give users the feeling of more personal computing, trust in protection and respecting the personal information, mobility across various devices, and natural interaction including speech, touch, ink and holograms.

Microsoft Edge – all-new browser with built-in commenting on the web via typing or inking, sharing comments and a reading view that helps read web sites faster and easier. Together with Cortana it offers quick results based on your preferences.

Office on Windows – in addition to the Office 2016 desktop suite, Windows 10 users will have access to new universal Windows applications for Word, Excel and PowerPoint, all available separately. With new touch-first controls in Excel you can create or update spreadsheets without a keyboard or mouse. OneNote and Outlook will be included as well.

Xbox Live and integrated Xbox App – new game experience in Windows 10 for both PCs and tablets. You can play games on your PC, streamed directly from your Xbox One console to your Windows 10 tablets or PCs, within home. You can communicate with your friends on Win 10 PCs and Xbox One while playing any PC game. Capture, edit and share with Game DVR, and play new games across devices.

Photos, Videos, Music, Maps, People, Mail and Calendar apps – updated design that looks and feels familiar from device to device. It is easy to start something on one device and continue it on another since the content is stored and synched through OneDrive.

Windows Continuum – enables today’s laptops and 2-in-1 devices smooth transition of the tablet into PC and back. New Windows phones can be connected with Continuum to a monitor, mouse and keyboard to make the phone work like a PC.

Windows Hello – uses biometric authentication of your face, iris or finger providing instant recognition, and there is no need to log in with password.

On July 29, you can get Windows 10 for PCs and tablets by taking advantage of the free upgrade offer, or on a new Windows 10 PC from your favourite retailer. The Windows 10 upgrade is designed to be compatible with your current Windows device and applications.

You can reserve your free Windows 10 upgrade now through a simple reservation process. Look for this icon in your system tray at the bottom of your screen, simply click on the icon, and then complete the reservation process.

If you would like to learn more on how to update your current Windows to Windows 10 read more about it here.

Microsoft Office 2016 is still in development and Microsoft offers any enthusiast to try out the new version and help them with feedback and provide insight. It is highly recommended that only users that are comfortable with installing and uninstalling programs, troubleshooting, backing up data and trying out new things, participate.

After the trial period expires, there is an option to purchase Office 365 subscription or reinstall the current version using original product key. There is no such option to run both versions of your existing Office and Office 2016 Preview.

If you do own Office 365 then there are some steps you will need to follow depending on the version you already have.

Home version

Go to the Office My Account page

Click Language and install options

Click Additional install options

Open the Version drop-down menu and select the 32 or 64-bit Office 2016 Preview

This will install the Office 2016 Preview on your device. You will stay on the Office 2016 Preview track until you uninstall the Office 2016 Preview or until Office 2016 is released.

Enterprise version

Sign in to the My Software page

Go to Try the next version of Office

Click Install

This will install the Office 2016 Preview on your device.

Office 365 administrators with an Office 365 ProPlus subscription can now enable the Office 2016 Preview for their organization by turning on First Release. You can read more about it here.

The Office 2016 Preview will be available until you uninstall the Office 2016 Preview or until Office 2016 is released.